J. Curtis - Calexit - The Anthology

He ‘stirred the pot’ to make sure his flight surfaces were free and unrestricted and waited for the engine to warm up.

As the engine warmed and the oil temp gauge began to move off the peg, he made sure that the cargo was tied down and his auxiliary fuel tank was still full.

Fifteen minutes later, the oil temp was in the green, and he shut the plane down.

He waited for his son. And checked his tablet for the progress of Diego Riviera and his men. They were nearly to the bridge.

He waited.

When the bridge blew, he heard it, even from three miles away. They were making good time (or had been, anyway). He’d just been setting his tablet to let him look at the camera that showed the bridge, and now he opened the window on the tablet and watched the pieces of wood and bridge timbers and decking rain down on the trucks. He was glad he’d set the second trip wire, as they were stopped now, at a point well past the first wire. The first must have failed.

He’d just committed himself. No turning back now. Of course, he had been committed, really, once he’d set his first stick and wired it. But now, it was real.

His phone rang. He looked at the number. Diego Riviera.

He debated for a second pushing it off to voice mail, but decided to answer it instead.

“Hello?”

“Mr. Daniels?”

“Yes.”

“What the fuck was that? The bridge exploded! You could have killed me and my men!”

“Sorry, Mr. Riviera, I did ask you to wait until tomorrow. You refused. Please, no one is hurt yet, turn around and come back later.”

“You asshole, you could have killed us! What the fuck are you doing?! You’ve crossed a line you can’t back away from now. When I get there, you are gonna be under arrest.”

“Please, Mr. Riviera, I set that off well away from your trucks so that no one would be hurt. You really should turn around. Tomorrow will be a better day for all of us.”

The phone made a noise and he couldn’t hear anything. He looked at his phone and realized that Diego had hung up on him.

He smiled.

He’d been mining the more or less played out mine for the past fifteen years, just enough that he’d been able to make a few dollars selling his silver to a company once or twice a year to pay his expenses. More importantly, that had allowed him to buy and possess explosives. He’d had to be certified and to get all of his licenses… But he had ’em, and he had his dynamite. No one knew exactly, however, how much he’d used and how much he’d stored. His paperwork always accounted for his “use” and he’d never stored his excess dynamite where it could be found in an inspection. It sure was handy having that now.

He turned to his tablet to see what was happening. Sure enough, Diego had his men out walking across the streambed, looking for more explosives. Watching them, he again thought that they were city folks, as their actions showed that they didn’t know what they were doing. Diego was talking on the phone, animatedly waving his arm and apparently shouting at someone on the other end.

As he watched, one of the smaller pickups began moving across the creek to the left of the ruined bridge. It made it all the way across. The stream was muddy, but with rocks underneath it was slippery, but not impassable. Then one of the big trucks did the same, taking a slightly different path. Slowly, each vehicle moved across the creek. Forty minutes later, they were all across.

He could only watch as they formed up and began to move forward again. But this time, they had a man walking in front of the trucks, looking down at the ground, looking for triggers. Again, though, their inexperience showed. If he’d set mines, or pressure triggers, they’d likely have missed them. Lucky for them, he hadn’t.

So far, they’d been delayed about forty-five minutes. Time to move.

Daniels fired up the ‘Cat and moved out. He wanted to get to the wires he’d left for the next culvert, but he had a stop to make first.

He drove quickly to the pond, and stopped at the spillway and pulled out ALL of the level boards. He’d never done that. He’d never had all of the boards out since he had built the pond nine years ago. They dammed up the stream enough to give him a decent ½ acre pond that stored up enough water to keep his fruit trees alive even during the dry summer months and gave him some of his off-grid electric through the micro-hydro generator. Now he was dumping all the water out to run downstream. He wasn’t ever gonna get to harvest the fruit anyway, and tomorrow he’d be either gone or arrested, so no need for power from the micro-hydro generator either…

He went down the path, still watching them in the tablet as they proceeded slowly down the road at the pace of the man looking for booby-traps. About twenty minutes later, that individual found the one at the two-foot culvert. They all stopped and looked, and talked. Waved their arms. Then, showing that Diego Riviera wasn’t stupid, they turned the vehicles and went right this time. Looking at the ground, they moved to the edge of the stream and tried to find a way across. The man driving the truck that Riviera was riding in pulled it to the edge of the stream and slowly drove down into the water and then, gunning it, up the other side. He almost got stuck, but climbed the edge and, leaving huge ruts, got back onto firm ground. He waved and gestured, and one of the 6 x 6 trucks tried. That vehicle was more capable, and he made it across, tearing more dirt and mud from the edge of the stream bank. One by one, the others started across.

While they were crossing, he parked the ‘Cat about a thousand yards from where he’d left his wires and sprinted over to find the ends of the wires.

Attaching the firing device, he moved to good cover and waited.

And waited. And waited some more… Watching on the tablet, he saw that the last of the three 6 x 6’s was having a hard time. The other vehicles had torn up the edge and it was fairly slippery with mud and the truck just couldn’t climb the edge. As he watched, the others got a chain and hooked one of the trucks already past the streambank to the bumper of the stuck one.

Good, more delays.

He texted his son again. ETA?

The answer came back before the truck was on solid ground. “Hour, maybe more.”

Shit.

The truck on firm ground pulled the last one up the bank.

The trucks reassembled on the road and began moving once again.

He dialed.

“Yes, what do you want?”

“Mr. Riviera. By now you know I am serious. And capable. Stop where you are. Just stop. Wait until tomorrow. Tomorrow, you can have free rein, tomorrow you can enter freely and take what you want. But not today. Just stop. No one needs to get hurt. Just stop. Turn around and wait for tomorrow.”

“Fuck you. I got lots more men coming. You are under arrest and will be tried for interfering with a Counselor. Lots more when I can think of charges. Give up NOW, sir.”

“I can’t and won’t. You are on my ground, on my land, and I don’t want to hurt anyone. Just stop.”

The phone again went dead.

He looked at it for a moment. Then sighed. So be it.

He watched as they approached. Once again, a man out front. Looking down. Looking for tripwires and whatever else might be out of the ordinary. Only this time, there wasn’t a tripwire for him to find. The trucks were bunched up, one of the 6 x 6’s in front and the rest close on its bumper. Clearly, the Counselor was letting someone else take the risk. Interesting.

He watched them approach the culvert, clearly expecting another ambush as they got closer to the stream. Let ’em. There were no tripwires to find, this time. The water from the pond had done its work, making sure that the flats on either side of the stream, normally at this time of the year only 6 inches across and about that deep, were soaked and muddy and impassable on both sides of the culvert. He just hoped the flood hadn’t affected his charges or washed away the wires as it rushed through the culverts.